Questions are emerging over possible conflicts-of-interest after The New York Times highlighted Qatari funding for U.S. think tanks, including the Brookings Institute, employer of former U.S. envoy Martin Indyk, who was directly involved in recent negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians.

“Qatar, the small but wealthy Middle East nation, agreed last year to make a $14.8 million, four-year donation to Brookings, which has helped fund a Brookings affiliate in Qatar and a project on United States relations with the Islamic world,” according to The Times.

The report comes just weeks after Israel vociferously voiced objection to Qatar’s funding of its major adversary, terror group Hamas.
In July, then Israeli President Shimon Peres told United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who was visiting the region, that Israel would not stand by while Qatar continued to finance Hamas militants.

In his last full day in office, Peres, a historically dovish leader, struck a defiant tone in a statement delivered to the media after meeting Ban at the President’s Residence, in Jerusalem.

“Qatar does not have the right to send money for rockets and tunnels which are fired at innocent civilians,” Peres said. “Their funding of terror the must stop.”

Newsweek‘s Benny Avni reported that the Qatari government also paid for the UN Secretary-General’s flight through the Middle East at the time, where his first stop was Doha, where he denounced Israel’s Operation Protective Edge.

While Brookings said its personnel were “not influenced by the views of our funders,” in 2012, The Times noted, the Qatari foreign ministry said that – thanks to a new accord with the institute, “the center will assume its role in reflecting the bright image of Qatar in the international media, especially the American ones.”

Additionally, in a recent report appearing in the UK-based Telegraph, both Qatar and Kuwait were singled out for openly, and even avidly, aiding fundraising efforts for Islamic State/ISIS terrorists who are currently engaged in fierce clashes with the Syrian army alongside Israel on the Golan Heights.

Hamas chief Khaled Meshaal, who lives in the Qatari capital, Doha, said on Aug 21, that “Our relationship with Qatar is not new… We appreciate Qatar’s stand, the brave political stand of its government and people,” after a meeting with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. “Qatar’s support is not just for Hamas movement, the country extends its support to all the Palestinian people,” Meshaal said, according to local media.

In comment over the figures in The Times’ report, Prof. Gerald Steinberg, president of Jerusalem-based funding watchdog, NGO-Monitor, told The Algemeiner that, “Indyk’s Brookings activities have been a part of the focus of this article, and the fact that Qatar is a primary funder of Brookings and that Qatar is also a major funder of Hamas are very clear conflicts of interest that Indyk never acknowledged, which makes all of the activities even more problematic than before.”

“Indyk was never forthcoming about that issue, and that’s the overall criticism that he’s faced,” Steinberg said.

Steinberg says that the report exposes a wider issue of NGO influence on U.S. and Israeli politics.

“This is a problem that Israel has faced for 20 years, and now it’s clear that this is something that the Americans are waking up to,” he noted.

“This isn’t just about Qatar,” he said. “It’s about Norway, it’s about the European Union. What the article didn’t say, for instance, was that the European Union provides money to political groups, NGOs, and think tanks, to lobby against the death penalty.”

“And, of course, they’re heavily manipulating Israeli politics in a much more intensive effort, basically to control the Israeli democratic process on issues like war and peace, and boundaries.”

Steinberg said that such issues “…have to be addressed just like funding for academic programs that specialize in the Middle East and are funded by Saudi Arabia, or another oil-rich countries; all are problematic because they inevitably have the spin the donor puts on them.”

On Facebook, commentator Rabbi Shmuley Boteach termed the article, a “devastating expose” of the Brookings Institute as an “agent of Qatar.”

Share this Story:

Let your voice be heard!

Somebody needs to look into National Public Radio and it’s associates for this same thing. I strongly suspect they’ve been getting the same kind of $$ from the same sources.

Victor Sharpe

It is no wonder that Qatar is pronounced in English, gutter!

Aaron S.

Follow the money. These meretricious hollow men sell their souls to the devil.

Dr.M.Otero

Of the estimated 600,000 Palestinians fled in 1948 and the youngest at age one and could remember Haifa, etc, he/she would now be 65 years old and there are no more than 30,000 still alive. They are bona fide refugees and should be welcome, if they so wish, to visit or spend their last days in their old communities or create new ones. The younger ones, 64 or younger, have never seen Israel nor do they have memories nor are they refugees no matter what they imagine. Our and UNRWA abetting them in their sick fantasies are showing them no kindness but ruining their lives and their futures as well as those of generations to come. It has been estimated that by 2060, there will be 15,000,000 of them to be supported.

Black is the new white!! Whether it’s our lawmakers, foreign states, you name it, allthese actions make up a greed so intense, the recipients don’t eve n ealize that their greed is what will eventually combust the entire world!!! what ever happened to love of country – democracy, honesty, virtue???

Hamas is only one of Qatar projects . Many others are on the pipeline . Qatar plays international games . Word countries looks upon to them due to their fabulous oil wealth

Jacqueline

One word disgusting Qutar. What would they do if no one ended their oil.

steven L

Qatar, Turkey and other sand rich-countries (intellectually/ethically poor) want to pay US dollars to brainwash the American people (Europe is already brainwashed and convinced) in believing that Israel is the problem. The problem is that they want the Jews to take the absurd risk of few more thousands year of persecution by the Christians, the Muslims and the seculars. Are the Jews THAT stupid! A lot of leftist Jews are willing to dump Israel in the believe that liberalism will be a safe haven for them. But it wont.
Israel cannot take any risk since they have almost nothing but their life and a tiny piece of land. The Muslims and the rest of the world have nothing to lose and take no risk whatsoever since they have 99.999999999 of everything! They do not have the o.ooooooooo1 that matters.

Kris Kristian

YOU KEEPON REFERING TO terrorists AS militants.
THEY ARE TERRROISTS.

Ivan Gur-Arie

Imagine if Indyk were in Auschwitz and was a member of the Judenrat. I dont have to say anymore,

And let’s not forget the $$ flowing out of Bahrain! Since it hosts our 6th fleet this administration must tread lightly about its politics. Just as Gulf States’ oil greases the machinery of their quiet anti-West machinations, so do their big $$ grease the spin-wheels of so many NGOs.

How many of our leading universities now feature Arab funded “Islamic Studies Centers”. The most recent one was just announced by the U of FL in Gainesville.
Big money buys all sizes of institutions!

benlopez

Np more money!

SHmuel HaLevi

Remarkably also general Ya’alon is mentioned as a former attendant to the Brookings. One may not be surprised if many other “cease fireists” are also part of the alumni roster there. Eventually everything will come out in the wash.

Allan Fritz

I think Brookings and Press in Europe are blaming Israel for defending itself. I think it is time for CAMERA to become much more active in the U.S.A. to counter these charges.

Joel

I buy almost everything in this article. But there is no way that Marty Indyk is an agent of Qatar, Hamas or any enemy of Israel. I agree he should have disclosed what he knew about Qatar’s funding. Qatar’s Sultan’s are a strange bunch – on the one hand supplying money to bankroll Hamas while at the same time being home to the United States Forward Central Command and USAF and RAF air groups. Amb. Indyk has to explain but until I see evidence that he betrayed the Israelis by undue persuasion or favoring Palestinians in some manner, I wont believe it.

Shameful. This comfortable relationship between Brookings Institute and Qatar is symbolic of one of the many Trojan Horse operations influencing our society. Universities are particulrly targeted by the generosity and shamefully accepted and used to buy Chairs for academic study. Man the Torpedoes, we have yet to see the outcome . We will soon see the Koran being praised and taught as peace loving literature.

Fred

That Qatar is a major donor to terrorist groups is nothing new. It is no wonder to see these bandit gangs well supplied with weaponry & provisions. Qatar is harbouring Hamas criminals. Qatar’s Emir puts his private jet at Ban Ki Moons disposal who uses it disregarding this corruptive gesture. Your article illustrates clearly how Brookings has been corrupted & the Arab dominated UN is corrupt and deviousness is the order of the day. What is the purpose of UN ?????

zvi

And this is just the tip of the iceberg. How about funding for Human rights watch, unions etc? Worth checking into!!!

nelson marans

Time to separate the good guys from the bad guys, a difference that this administration is apparently unable or unwilling to make. Just because Qatar is an energy source does not mean that it is a good guy as has been proven by its recent actions.

Jeff Blankfort

All very interesting, particularly when one finds out that Haim Saban paid Brookings $12.3 million in 2002 to set up the Saban Center for the the Middle East and that the Brookings Center in Doha is part of the Saban Center.

Will Steinberg now accuse Saban of secretly working for the Palestinians? I don’t think so, but with Steinberg, one never knows. But is that any more ridiculous than implying the same thing of Martin Indyk, former AIPAC staff member and the first director of The Washington Inst. on Middle East Policy? Adding Boteach to the mix is surely a sign of desperation.

art

Indyk has an unconscionable and immoral conflict of interests. He has a pecuniary interest with qatar and hamas. This also clarifies the viciousness of his attacks on Israel It also shows the BAD FAITH of OBAMA. This should be a public and campaign issue. It shows the moral corruption of the Obama administration Obviously Indyk was bought and paid for

Eric R.

I’m not surprised that a kapo like Indyk would be OK with money from Islamonazis like the Qataris.

E Pluribus Wombat

The Obama administration has no conflict of interest. Its interest is in crushing Israel via paperwork. Arabs do it with guns, Obama does it with the media, lawyers and threats.